Wiretapping Lawsuit Against AT&T Dismissed

BalanceOfJudgement writes "A major victory by the federal government was won today when a federal judge dismissed the lawsuit against AT&T for providing phone records to the federal government. From the article: 'The court is persuaded that requiring AT&T to confirm or deny whether it has disclosed large quantities of telephone records to the federal government could give adversaries of this country valuable insight into the government's intelligence activities'" Not to be confused with the EFF case, this case was filed by the ACLU on behalf of author Studs Terkel and other activists who argued that their constitutional rights had been violated by the actions of AT&T and the NSA.

Comments

enemies of this country

[Anonymous Coward]

One has to ask one's self who the true enemies of this country are.

either way

[spykemail]

I really don't have all of the details so I can't actually say for sure whether this lawsuit would have uncovered information that could have decreased the United States' ability to combat terrorists, however, the truth is I DON'T CARE. There are a lot of things that COULD be done to increase security in the States, but many of them would be worse than the very things they would seek to eliminate. From what I know I would argue that this is probably one of them, though again, I don't know the true details. In a free country you simply can't have allegedly illegal government programs that aren't subject to claims of illegality. There's an argument to be made for suspending such things in times of true emergency, distant conflicts with various terrorist organizations likely to last indefinitely not being one.

More than likely there is an extensive spying program with relatively poor and easily avoidable detection methods and that's the reason it is being so well protected. Only the atmosphere of fear, uncertainty, and doubt is helping them "fight" terror, the program itself probaby doesn't do much besides producing false positives. If the details were made public it would almost certainly be cancelled even if it was legal.

Re:This seems a little strange

[Penguinoflight]

Well on the bright side, this was not a ruling, it was a dismissal of a case. It might set precedent, but I dont think precedent is used for determining if a case is valid for judging. On the other hand, the government was a third party in this dispute, so by denying the ruling based on the government the judge has made a situation where the only just thing to do is to rule in favor of the victims. Too bad justice isn't in the system any more.

"Adversaries" don't need confirmation. Citizens do

[vux984]

'The court is persuaded that requiring AT&T to confirm or deny whether it has disclosed large quantities of telephone records to the federal government could give adversaries of this country valuable insight into the government's intelligence activities'

In other words, "adversaries of this country" can safely assume AT&T disclosed large quantities of telephone records. In the unlikely event that they didn't, our adversaries will surely and prudently prefer err on the side of caution.

Citizens of this country, by contrast, have been denied even the semblance of justice, as their own government tramples over their rights.

If that isn't victory for the "adversaries of this country" I don't know what would be.

Re:Laughable

[Tom]

Not only that, but the rest of the world is watching and drawing its own conclusions.

It is. I know a fairly good number of highly technically skilled people - including myself - who are staying away from the USA and are turning down invitations to speak at conferences, coach upper-level management and other opportunities.
My current policy is that if my skills are so valuable that you want the entire board of directors to attend for two full days, then you can fly them somewhere outside USA borders as well. Canada would do, or a nice place in the carribean.
I'm not going to enter the USA for the forseable future, and neither are many of my friends.

Re:RIP America

[dfjghsk]

This may seem like a radical idea to you, but perhaps people vote for Rupublicans or Democrats because they are the most toward the center in American politics, and most people find they agree with them more than many third party candidates. Who would you suggest I vote for?

Libertarian party -- the largest 3rd party currently?
Wants to legalize prostitution, end restrictions on illegal drugs (including cocaine, heroin, etc), and is for same-sex marriage. The prostitution thing will prevent (the majority) of one-half of the population from voting for them.. and most parents would never vote for relaxing restrictions on meth, cocaine, etc. Not to mention the religious vote (remember you do live in a country where 97% of the population associates with one of the major religions)... And whatever your opinion on same-sex marriage is, you have to agree that right now at least, the majority is not for it. Without women or parents, I don't think they are going to be winning any national elections soon (at least not for president).

Green party?
The war on drugs issue again... Cocaine, meth, heroin... what person would vote for relaxing the laws on those? Not most people. Same-sex marriage again... They do have some big ideas though.. lets see how many people are for: Abolishing the U.S. senate; getting rid of all U.S. intelligence agencies: NSA, CIA, etc; and abolishing the death penalty (we tried that already.. didn't work so well).. Not to mention their plans to destroy the U.S. economy, and their other ridiculous plans (even if you agree with these, you have to admit that their opponents will label these this way in a race):

Guaranteed jobs
12.50 min wage
30 hour work week paid as 40 hours (ie: give everyone an extra 125/min per week)
Life long public education -- there goes Americas private colleges: Harvard, Yale, etc.
Shut down all nuclear plants
Break up corporate agribusiness -- there goes several billion-dollar businesses
Every 20 years a company's charter must be reviewed to see if the government agrees with it -- no abuse could happen there
Break up every company with more than 10% market share
Every worker should be able to elect their managers -- I always wanted to slack off at work.. this is sure to help the American economy
Break up the 500 largest businesses in America
6 weeks vacation time for everyone + the 10 federal holidays
1 year paid educational leave every 7 years -- we'll just fire everyone every 6 years.. how does that sound?
1 year parental leave for each child
End all free trade treaties, and withdrawl from WTO

Military:
Cut spending by 75%, and eventually by 99%
withdraw all international forces and close all bases outside the U.S.
disarm all chemical, nuclear, and biological weapons
get rid of all offensive forces -- because apparently we can defend ourselves with just the national guard, and the coast guard
Disband NATO

Are you fucking serious? There is a reason virtually no one votes for these people...